1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to systems and methods for collecting, analyzing, transmitting, and acting on information collected from instruments monitoring and controlling equipment used for fluid hydrocarbon (principally natural gas) well production including collection platforms, pipeline insertion platforms, and the like.
2. Background Information
Where natural gas and other fluid hydrocarbons are found in the earth, producers may drill multiple bore holes (wells) in the earth to capture the hydrocarbon products. Producers often aggregate the output from individual wells by routing pipes from nearby individual wells to a common location for connection to a distribution pipeline. The collection of valves, gauges, pumps, filters, and other equipment at the common location are often attached to a rectangular metal structure. The structure, with the attached equipment, is sometimes referred to as a platform or skid. Another aggregation of fluid hydrocarbon production equipment is a pipeline insertion platform. In this application, the term skid includes a variety of aggregated equipment configurations including a collection platform, a pipeline insertion platform, and the like.
Typically, producers monitor and control several different characteristics of production including pipeline pressure, instantaneous flow rate, accumulated flow, etc., and control pressures and flows to meet business and safety needs. In current practices, producers often use discrete analog pressure gauges, analog flow meters, and digital flow meters to display key information. Many of these discrete instruments lack any wireless communication or telemetry capability. A person must visually inspect—“read”—each instrument's display to determine the state of the condition the instrument is monitoring—to get a “reading.” To make the data available for others' uses, a person must record each instrument's reading, often by handwriting multiple instruments' readings on a paper form. Subsequently, a data entry person may transfer the handwritten information from the paper report into a computer database.
Problems with Current Practices
Current practices have a number of limitations which increase the cost and decrease the completeness, accuracy, and usefulness of fluid hydrocarbon production monitoring and control data gathered from collection platforms, pipeline insertion platforms, and the like (skids).
First, the only way to capture the skid instrument's data is by a person visually inspecting the instrument. A person must locate, identify, and read the instrument, and then record the reading. The person may misread the instrument, inadvertently skip one or more instruments, or be unable to read the instrument because its indicator is visually obscured by rain, snow, ice, dust, or the like. Even if the person reads the instrument correctly, the person may write down the wrong reading, make an illegible entry, misattribute the reading to a different instrument, damage the paper form, or simply fail to record the reading. When the readings on the paper form are entered into a computer database, other errors may arise. For example, the data value may be entered incorrectly, misattributed, or omitted.
Second, human visual inspection, recording, and transcription lack immediate feedback for many data collection and entry errors. The person reading the instrument may not know whether the reading is within a normal range, is indicating an undesired condition, or is indicating a failed instrument that needs to be reset, repaired, or replaced. If a reader fails to read a particular instrument, the reader may not detect the omission until after leaving the site. Similarly, when recording a reading, a reader may not recognize that he has incorrectly attributed a reading from instrument A to instrument B.
Third, hard-wired instruments can be costly to install or replace. The instrument is usually attached to the sensing or controlling point, but may require a separate display to indicate the instrument's reading and has wires connecting the instrument to the display. The wiring and discrete display can add significant costs. For example, a hard-wired instrument has an average installed cost of $1,000.
As explained above, current data collection and recording practices not only reduce data accuracy and completeness and increase data acquisition costs, they also undermine the processes for which the data is being collected. Production managers make production, maintenance, and safety decisions based on reported data. Inaccurate data collection and recording or delayed analysis and transmittal may increase costs and reduce profits. In the extreme, such problems may cause damage to the environment or even loss of life.
Recent Technologies and Limitations
Recent technologies, if used in support of novel systems and methods, can overcome some of the data collection and recording problems related to legacy systems and methods. For example, a modern handheld computer may include features such as short- and long-range wireless communication systems, a digital camera, a geographical position fixing system such as a global navigation satellite system with single meter accuracy, and storage for applications, images, and data. Modern instrument systems offer “bolt-on” instruments that can wirelessly communicate their readings and do not require a separate, remote display. These self-contained instruments may be bolted onto a pipe or manifold which they are to sense. Some bolt-on instruments contain an internal battery that enables the instrument to transmit its data wirelessly to a data collection device or system. These and other technologies can be adapted for use in gas production monitoring and control systems and methods.
Desirable Improvements
There are many improvements in data collection, analysis, recording, and transmitting systems and methods that gas producers would welcome. For example, as a partial list of desirable improvements, producers want to:                1. spend less time collecting and entering the data,        2. reduce the cost of collecting and recording the data,        3. increase the accuracy and completeness of the data,        4. decrease the time required to respond to out-of-tolerance readings,        5. reduce wasted resources and lost profits caused by data errors, and        6. reduce the risk of harm to the environment and personnel.Further, it is highly desirable that any systems or methods that accomplish these improvements support skids with both wireless-enabled and non-wireless-enabled instruments.        
The present invention includes systems and methods that reduce or eliminate many of the problems with the current practices, provide the desired improvements, and permit future expansions and adaptations.